HAMILTON CITY LANDLORDS TO PUSH AHEAD WITH EARTHQUAKE STRENGTHENING -11 May

Hamilton city landlords are unlikely to take the extra time afforded to complete earthquake strengthening work on buildings but will instead push ahead with upgrades to meet tenants' expectations. Waikato fell into the medium risk seismic risk zone with new timeframes for assessment of 10 years and strengthening work to be carried out within 25 years

PREDICTION RESERVE BANK WILL BE FORCED TO DROP OFFICIAL INTEREST RATE -11 May

ANZ economists are now picking that the Reserve Bank will be forced to drop official interest rates as soon as next month - and follow up with a further cut a month later. The forecast - almost an urging - from the country's biggest bank adds to pressure on the RBNZ ahead of its Financial Stability Report on Wednesday, which is sure to focus on Auckland's raging hot housing market. The interest rate cut prediction, from ANZ chief economist Cameron Bagrie, followed release of the ANZ's monthly inflation gauge.https://www.interest.co.nz/news/75403/anz-economists-now-expect-rbnz-official-interest-rates-june-followed-another-cut-july

Regional economic growth is quickly becoming an 'us and them', according to a new study from the Salvation Army. However, the Government insists it's on the right track. The report, called Mixed Fortunes, singles out Northland and the East Coast as regions which are lagging behind, while other findings predict Aucklanders will be younger, wealthier, better skilled and more ethnically-diverse than the rest of the country. Alan Johnson, Social Policy Analyst for The Salvation Army's Social Policy and Parliamentary Unit, said it was "virtually a North Island/South Island thing". http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/study-says-nz-regions-getting-left-behind-cities-6312063 - 12 May

A banking expert says new lending restrictions targeting Auckland property investors will make banks' loan books safer but may fail to significantly cool the city's surging housing market. And there is a risk that some banks might race to do as much high loan-to-value (LVR) lending to investors as possible before the new rules come into effect on October 1, said Massey University's David Tripe. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11447881 – 13 May

TENANTS ARE THE LOSERS

Landlords have expressed dismay at 30 per cent rental property loan-to-value ratio (LVR) rules, saying tenants will suffer, rents will rise and Auckland rental properties will become more scarce. Andrew King, NZ Property Investors Federation executive officer, said Auckland was already suffering from a rental property shortage and the Reserve Bank would exacerbate that. "This is going to hurt tenants and there is actually a shortage of rental property in Auckland," he said.

Andrew Bruce, Auckland Property Investors Association president, expressed unhappiness about the new measures. "If the Reserve Bank is wanting to create distortions and unintended consequences in the market they'll achieve this with the latest policy.

Property investors in the Auckland Council area will have to have a deposit of 30 per cent under new lending rules announced by the Reserve Bank. The Reserve Bank will introduce a new asset class from October 1 covering property investors, defined as any mortgage secured on a home that is not an occupied by its owner. The bank had been in talks with private lenders to agree on a definition, which would then require lenders to hold more capital against those loans, Mr Wheeler said. To recognise more subdued housing markets outside Auckland, the Reserve Bank will ease the restrictions on high-LVR lending for all residential lending to 15 per cent from the existing 10 per cent. The 10 per cent speed limit will stay in place for Auckland owner-occupiers. The new restrictions on Auckland lending won't apply to mortgages to build new houses or apartments.http://home.nzcity.co.nz/news/article.aspx?id=206571 – 13 May

The new measures have surprised the Property Investors Federation which claims the Reserve Bank hasn't attacked the root cause. NZPIF executive officer Andrew King claims the measures will have a "negligible effect on Auckland house prices" while leading to a reduction in rental properties and higher rents." got 53,000 people coming in," he says. "The supply and demand issues are way out of kilter because we're not building enough houses for that amount of people."http://tvnz.co.nz/national-news/new-housing-regulations-more-holes-than-slice-swiss-cheese-6312328 - 13 May

The Reserve Bank settled on a 70% loan-to-value ratio restriction as the upper limit of how much residential property investors can borrow when buying a house in Auckland due to analysis of global investor markets. So says Bernard Hodgetts, head of the Reserve Bank's macro financial department, who acknowledges the analysis has "no hard science" behind it. The new restriction, planned from October 1, is expected to cover about half of all lending to Auckland residential property investors from bankshttp://www.interest.co.nz/news/75462/rbnzs-bernard-hodgetts-regulators-about-face-auckland-specific-lvr-restrictions-and-why - 14 May

HAWKE’S BAY HOUSING MARKET BOOSTED BY CHANGES - 14 May

Tremains Real Estate director and co-owner Simon Tremain also welcomed the proposed changes. He said the LVRs would encourage investors to look outside the Auckland market. "Anything that releases the Reserve Bank restrictions is going to be good, and anything that gives more buying power to the regions over Auckland has also got to be good." He said the region's housing market was the best he had seen it since before the global financial crisis, as evidenced by climbing prices.http://www.nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-today/property/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503451&objectid=11448496 – 14 May

HOLDING MORE CAPITAL FOR INVESTOR LENDING - 16 May

To cut a long story short, although we applaud the Reserve Bank from taking a stand as part of its financial stability mandate, we do not agree with the proposed approach to solve the concentration of housing investment risks in the banking sector. Purporting to have false accuracy by finely tuning relatively untested policies seems like a complicated way for the Reserve Bank to achieve a simple goal. If the Bank really wants to protect the financial system from these risks, then a less convoluted approach would be to directly increase the amount of capital that banks’ must hold on their balance sheet to cover their residential investment property loan book. Not surprisingly, the chorus of support for this approach among economists is rather quiet, given that most regular commentators work for the banks themselves.http://www.interest.co.nz/opinion/75515/benje-patterson-wonders-why-requiring-banks-hold-more-capital-property-investor - 16 May

PM’s ANNOUNCEMENT ON MEASURES TO CRACK DOWN ON PROPERTY SPECULATORS - 17 May

Prime Minister John Key has announced Budget 2015 will include a range of measures to crack down on property speculators who sell houses within two years, and he has announced foreign buyers will have to register with the IRD and have a New Zealand bank account. Key said the Budget this week will contain several measures to bolster tax rules on property transactions and to help Inland Revenue enforce them. They include:

Investors and housing commentators have blamed speculators for driving up Auckland house prices and the new policy targets this group. However NZ Property Investors' Federation executive officer Andrew King is not sure the change will do much to curb prices. "Whether this policy actually reduces house prices in Auckland will really depend on whether speculators or traders are a big part of the reason why house prices are going up in the Auckland area. “If they are, then this will have an effect on prices. But if they're not, then it won't." Mr King said the reason it was hard to tell how much speculators were affecting the market was because it was difficult to track them, and there was little information on other major players like foreign investors either.http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/regional/273872/investors-question-house-tax-move - 18 May